I guess I would tell someone I primarily work on paper, prefferibly stretched over panels. I use a wide range of mediums, gouache, enamel, oil, etc. My imagery derives from various interests I have, drug/alcohol consumption, Suburbia, and Santeria to name a few.

Influences?

Jazz, Giorgio Morandi, James Bond, the Lost Bros familia, my dog Bubba Gucci, but my biggest influence has got to be my father. Hardest working man I know.

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

PIZZA!/ Sam's Burgers on broadway

Favorite place traveled?

Haven't done much traveling, but I recently visited New York for the first time last summer and was pretty stoked on it.

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

I try an work either early in the morning, but I usually end up working on things late at night shackled in my atelier listening to some jazz or oldies. You know, that Art Laboe shit.

My work mainly consists of mixed media drawings and paintings of nonsensical figures/environments. A lot of it is about mankind's relationship to Nature, in both physical and metaphysical realms. Recently I've also been making animations and sculptures that deal with similar narratives.

Influences?

My biggest inspiration is the natural world; what separates man from animal, and how have we evolved to conceptualize and comprehend our own existence as independent entities from the world around us. Mythology, philosophy, religious iconography, and cultural practices all play a part in the narrative of my work. Visual influnences include the Northern Renaissance period, Greek and Roman antiquity, fauvism, Christopher Davison, Picasso, Allison Shulnik, Jan Švankmajer, Dasha Shiskin, Dürer, Lucas Cranach the Elder, and countless others. Influences really come from everything.

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Cheese please.

Favorite place traveled?

North Wales.

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

I basically lock myself in my studio and pretty much just do whatever I want, no rules. I make myself be stay productive and use my work as exploration of new ideas. I'm always looking for that next image or theme to expand on or experiment with. In the studio I listen to everything from the Black Angels to Panda Bear to Om. I make work around my job schedule, so it all kind of depends.

How do you pay the bills?

I run my own screen printing company and fill in some hours at a library, which also serves as an endless resource of history and imagery. I also have some potential teaching opportunities in the near future.

My work is about visual fragmentation. About rebuilding. I follow paradoxical ideas at the edge of the legacy of romantism. A touch of insanity, a dance between rational and irrational, I just try to escape reality. I considere myself an abstract painter, playing with the contrast between hyperrealism and expressionism. I try to marry the two. By the way this is not a question I can answer, as my answer is the piece itself.

Influences?

I am perpetually influenced by everything, my work is based on layers, as our memories are. The raster made out of thoses bring me to new horizons. That's why I am not only influenced by the old paint masters but also on the multiple failures of mankind. by the nature, by your questioning as well as by the silence in the morning, by the words of poets, and by the screams of Earth.

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Definitly both but self made.

Favorite place traveled?

Well the next one. I am interessted in the concept of traveling not in places. And this has to be contrasted, I like to observe confrontation. Visual opposition. I am walking the same ways over and over and I find something unseen everyday. I am an observer and I need therefore more time on a new place to understand it. Africa have left a big influence on my acceptance of chaos.

Geometric and architectural forms that mirror both my weariness and confidence of the future.
I'm drawing from a beautiful, yet growingly ominous midwest landscape. I use a bright, neon
and pastel palette to balance a heavier line, and to convey a wishful personal conscious. When
composing work, I tend to centralize imagery of the most importance.

Well, I'm living in a shed right now, so i just wake up and I'm pretty much in the middle of
my studio. If I have no money-making schemes to pursue that day, then I'll just work until I'm
ready for bed or a movie. Lately I've been listening to a lot of oldies, but mostly the sound of
my dogs barking.

I was born and breed in Southern California and I spend most of my time now making graphite drawings. I also work with my friend Naheed Simjee on a range of really exciting projects with artists through our company SIMJEE TEXTOR.

I would describe my work as hyperrealistic graphite drawing. The theme of the work varies but I often include elements like smoke, filtered light, negative space, water and rocks to create organic uncommon images of natural environments.

Useless Struggle / 46" x 35.75" / graphite on paper

Describe your process for creating new work.

The initial stages involve some tinkering in photoshop to make adjustments and to get a sense for what the finished product will look like. It is a lot easier to erase clouds or add more trees when you are working on a computer than to hand draw it. Deciding on the scale of the work is an important part of the process and I'm slowly creeping towards making larger and larger work although I also enjoy the intimate scale of the smaller works.

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

I'm a night person so I'm usually the most productive between 10pm and 2am but if I'm working on a show I'm drawing all day every day and I become a bit obsessive about it. Music, podcasts, Netflix or something is always playing since the work can become monotonous and this part of the process does not involve a lot of decision making. Sometimes I get a song stuck in my head and play it on repeat until I finish the piece so I'll end up listening to the same song a couple hundred times in a row. That military torture technique would never work on me.

Smoking Ledge / 20" x 14" / graphite on paper

Influences?

Storytelling and strong narratives, chain emails of crazy photos from around the world and the internet. I'm interested in the general pursuit of discovery. The amount of information out there these days can be overwhelming but it is fascinating how one subject can lead to another and in turn, how they relate to each other.

Grew up in New Jersey but currently living in Baltimore. Just turned
23. Graduated from MICA last May. www.laurajudkis.com.

How would you describe your work to someone?

Lately my work has taken a sculptural turn, but I come from a painting
background. I make aggressive, psychologically charged abstractions.
I'm interested in the tactile and sensual qualities of my materials,
and I'm hoping for visceral reactions.

I am an interdisciplinary artist with an emphasis in painting, sculpture and theater.

Location? Age? Education? Website?

I moved to the United States from Taiwan when I was 14. This experience of being transplanted from my home, family, and culture had a huge impact on me and my works. After receiving my M.A. in studio arts from University of Iowa, I went back to Taiwan for my solo exhibition and a few set design projects. I plan to move back to the states in 2012.

The images that I paint all have some disturbing quality, whether it's the angle of the character's head or the awkwardness of the distorted bodies. But in order to complicate these unsettling images, I use strong yellow hues to create a warm overall lighting that emanates throughout the entire space. I like this idea of “peaceful violence,” of seducing the viewer with bright colours, while simultaneously confronting them with the damaged characters.

Describe your process for creating new work.

I normally spend a few months developing a series of images and then over the course of an evening take a number of photographs and experiment with different compositions and lighting. For my works in my house, I usually choose rooms with more angular architecture and multiple lighting sources. There is something cold and inhuman about many of the new high rise apartments in Taipei, with their cold, reflective marble floors, fluorescent lights, and long corridors. These apartments seem more like conference rooms or hotels.

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

I usually work at night. ( late, late night ). I like listening to music when I work, but I always forget to turn it on.

I'm 24, I was born and raised in the bay area, where I graduated from
the indomitable San Francisco Art Institute in 2010. Currently I live
in New Haven Connecticut where I'm wrapping up my MFA at Yale.
(www.TomBetthauser.com)

How would you describe your work to someone?

Right now I just say that I make landscapes. It's vague, but I like
the way it makes people (including myself) interact with the work, and
it leaves me with a lot of room to explore the core of what I'm
interested in.

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Describe your process for creating new work.

I like the idea of creating a world from the ground up. I start very
abstractly, with large areas of dark and light, and then try to pull a
blank landscape out of that. Once that's built I'm free to explore and
add elements of content as necessary.

I am a contemporary figurative painter, who creates mixed-media paintings with a penchant for bright colors, geometric shapes, and street-art forms. My work explores the relationship between cultural plurality and a recycling of pop-culture, by layering different motifs from Science Fiction film stills and quotations from an art historical background, like Symbolism and color-field paintings. Overall I am constantly studying the possibilities of oil paint as a medium and trying to push my boundaries.

In the summer of 2009 I undertook a journey by car for several weeks along the French and Spanish-Atlantic coast with stops in Paris, Bordeaux, Vieux-Boucau, Biarritz, San Sebastian and Bilbao. I enjoyed myself immensely.

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

Sometimes I like the sound and the noise of the studio building with its different characters, but usually I love to listen to: audio books, The Cure, David Bowie, Jimi Hendrix, Elvis Costello, Erykah Badu, The Fugees, Faith No More, Jeff Buckley, Amy Winehouse, John Lennon, and Lassie Singers, (among others). Honestly I have no real daily routine, I paint when I am hot for my work. Late in the evening is the best time to concentrate. During the nighttime I get ready for new things and I have my best ideas.

I usually tell them that I make really big drawings of hairy faces where hair becomes an unnatural extension of personality and whim of the subject. The work is about challenging those heavily coded ideas about the beautiful and the grotesque that exist in our culture. However, I find it’s much easier to just show them on my iPhone.

Influences?

Right now I’m reading a lot of John Wyndham, H.G. Wells, Charles Burns, and revisiting the X-Files.

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Double cheese burgers.

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

Most days I tend to wake up late, take shamefully long showers followed by making myself a hot breakfast. I ride my bike to my studio while running errands along the way. I’m usually in studio from early afternoon and into the night. While I enjoy the musical stylings of everything from Destroyer to the best of DMX, I prefer playing television shows on my laptop. Right now I’m in a three-way affair between Farscape, The Wire and Six Feet Under.

My work is about contrasts, both in technique and subject matter. Insistingly trying to assimilate happiness, violence and symbolism within each image. I often use both large and small brushes, toggling between faster and more concentrated painting sessions.

Influences?

I love the playfulness of Asger Jorn, Martin Kippenberger, Picasso and Jeff Koons. The light of Turner and William Hammershøi. The patience of Elina Merenmies. The fleshiness of a Lucien Freud. The energy of a Throw Up or Molinex. The eclecticism of Wim Delvoye. Kristian Bust, when he points out things in a Martin Parr photograph that I did not see before. Old ornaments. Philip Guston's colors, Paul McCarthy's shapes, or Greyson Perry's textiles. Tal R's arrogance, the secrecy and conceit of graffiti - and Katharina Grosse when she paints everything with her huge spray can.

I do not want to explain anything special to anyone through my abstract works. I ask the viewer to interpret everything the way they want and in their own way. As for experienced viewers, I am interested in their criticism of visual elements.

Influences?

There are too many, and I do not know where to start with the listing. I am afraid I could confuse someone if I mention only a few that come to my mind right now. Lately, I admire new Chinese artists. They are great. There are, certainly, young American artists who are leading, then Europeans, and others – Asians, Korean, Indian... At my age, for me, younger artists are maybe a little better model than older ones. It is hard to explain why is that so.

I live in Milwaukee, I'm 23. I'll be 24 in 3 hours. I received a bachelor's degree in painting from the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design. My website is www.hueycrowley.com.

How would you describe your work to someone?

I would say that "They are dirty-Disney colored paintings from a tingling, nintendo-influenced dimension." I would mention that they speak to some 70's warped, screwball, acid-shit. Ominous things have always attracted me, and they show up in my work often.

Inevitably, I paint a lot of the Midwest too, but in a way like you'd discover a rained-on, muddy care-bear in someone's backyard that their Doberman was chewing on. Mystical and disturbing things attract me and I try to harness them with paint.

London, UK, Quite a bit but none relating to the Art world, www.njcox.com

The Black Basque, Oil on Linen, 36” x 30”

How would you describe your work to someone?

Given up on that . . I’d whip out my iPhone and show them . . . A picture paints a 1000 words, and all that.

Influences?

I’m self taught. So much has influenced how/what I paint . . The Transglobe Expedition opened my eyes to solitude and vast landscapes then Yves Tanguy showed me how endless a background can be on canvas. . Vermeer and his peers got my full attention with their eye for detail and precision, Dali made me drool, Max Ernst told me to experiment, but Odd Nerdrum is the Master . . . my art GOD. But influences are everywhere.

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Does a tofu have legs?

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

Up daily at 7am, in the studio by 9.30 and then look and see what I want to work on most. On a good day I can work till 9pm . . on a normal day I wind down around 6pm. Pretty much paint 7 days a week when working towards a show. Love painting in daylight.

I prefer to have about 6 paintings on the go (Unless working on a major large piece) I’m a mood painter and a bit of a butterfly.

Can’t paint without my music . . it creates a cocoon for me to work within and sets and nurtures my mood. Always start with something slow . . .Koop, David Sylvian, Enigma, Lee Oskar, Software, Air, Thievery Corporation etc

Lately I’ve been starting with Koop every morning and when the day grows old, get onto more motivating tunes . . . Steely Dan or Ziggy Stardust for a final push. I have about 2,000 Cds ranging from classical to punk . . so never stuck for good vibes.

Probably very poorly. I’m not much of a writer. I would much prefer to show someone my work and let it speak for itself, let them come up with their own meaning based on their own personal experience with the work. There’s a lot more power in that. But basically I’m just observing and reacting to what I see going on around me and in our society. Observing values and ideals and trying to create a realistic and honest visual document. And I love the idea of using something that is so empty and meaningless to create a work of art that is relevant and meaningful. I still use paint when I need to, but with the kind of ideas I’m exploring it seems a lot more honest and direct to use the images that we’re bombarded with daily as drawing/painting tools, the very things that are telling us what’s normal and not normal, what’s beautiful and not beautiful, what’s desirable and not desirable, what life is supposed to be. A kind of amalgamation of form and content.

I weave tapestries of the pictures you would delete if you ever uploaded that drunk night of debauchery from your camera.

Influences?

I am influenced by old tapestry weavers that made huge gritty abstract tapestries, Helena Hernmarck who weaves images with incredible detail, skateboarder blogs where street art and huge consumptions of alcohol is mixed with shots of random girls' breasts, everyday life, and things that happen on a more personal or family level that can be related to it all.

Kiss - 41" x 31" Handwoven Tapestry

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Tofu burger with french fries and a diet coke.

Working routine? Music? Time of day?

Ideally I work from 2pm to 4am. I have music, npr, internet tv or nothing going. It depends on which part of the process I'm working on.

Kiss - in process

How do you pay the bills?

I pay my bills with residency stipends, selling some work and a part time job at whole foods market. Money is rough, but luckily Philly is cheap and I've got a low standard of living.

Portland, Oregon. 32. Bachelor of Science in Drawing, Painting, Printmaking, and a Minor in Graphic Design from Portland State University. www.garrettpriceart.com

How would you describe your work to someone?

Someone once described my work as cockroach art, meaning it looks like it has survived nuclear exposure. I would describe it as my photography and designs acid etched, or rusted, into the surface of steel plates. The framed steel plate hangs on the wall like a painting. My imagery is often desolate landscapes, with visual traces of human existence. The steel backgrounds, with their natural imperfections, add texture and atmosphere, as well as a direct physical and conceptual connection to the imagery.

Influences?

The up and down cycles of my emotions. Industrial architecture, nature and history.

We met a young skater named Charles Martin, an interesting guy studying at SFAI, through our friend Henry Gunderson. Charles would stop in the gallery from time to time, and the last time he came through he told us he was off to NYC to study at Cooper Union where his brother also studys. Getting into Cooper Union is no small feat. They're one of the most selective schools in the U.S. Well known for their art and science programs, C.U. admits students based on merit alone and provides each with a full-tuition scholarship. A FREE top rate highly demanding education.

Into his first year at Cooper Union we wanted to see what Charles was working on and know how he was handling the big city and the school's heavy demands.

Charles in his studio space.

How is Cooper Union going? Is it as tough as people have said?

We get a lot of homework; we have a lot of classes. Most of our time goes to school. The toughest part for me has been time management which is a large part of what it seems we’re supposed to learn in this first year. People who can’t keep up get the boot. There are a lot of distractions in Manhattan, that if you can fall victim to, it only makes it harder. I heard some things before coming here that proved to be complete lies in my situation. It gets really nerve wrecking at times, but no pain, no gain.

You're a Bay Area guy. How is the Big Apple treating you?

It’s a lot different than San Francisco. If I could change one thing it would be the winter. I grew up in Buffalo, NY so I’m pretty accustomed to snow, maybe even TOO accustomed to the snow; me and old man winter have a love hate relationship. New York has been really overwhelming, but I am definitely enjoying myself.

Besides schoolwork, what have you been up to?

This semester I have less foundation classes so I’ve been able to paint a lot more. From January fourth to 18th was winter break, so the school was open but NO ONE was here. It was AWESOME I just got to come to my studio everyday and make work, no assignments. I’ve been reading about black history and other radical organizations that make it their business to fight whatever injustices they face. I also have a book about Einstein and a couple of memoirs. When I can I work on my apartment. I just got some rolls of film, and I found out that my school has a color processor, so I'm going to check that out. There’s a yoga studio really close that I've been trying to take advantage of.

Chris Dacre emailed over a few photos from his current show at Sharadin Gallery as part of his three week residency with Kutztown University in Kutztown, PA. Really like the images and wanted to get some more info on this artist we're unfamilar with. The show "War is Great!" runs through March 4, 2011.

Location? Age? Education? Website?

Las Cruces, NM (temporarily), 39, MFA in Printmaking from the University of
Arizona, www.chrisdacre.com

How would you describe your work to someone?

Surveillance, the threat of nuclear attack, terrorism, ongoing wars in foreign
lands; my work is a commentary on these sensitive issues. I use sarcasm, humor
and cynicism to drive home my point-of-view and invite the viewer to question
and explore the absurdities of war. My imagery is pulled from the eight years I
spent in the Air Force, stories that are buried in the news, movies, documentaries
and books on war.

Influences?

Early on my influences were the Looney Tunes, especially Bugs Bunny. Artists I
look to are Chris Burden, Red Grooms, Claus Oldenburg, Judy Pfaff, Alexander
Caulder and Maurizio Cattelan – all for different reasons. I’ve always been
fascinated by military aircraft and tanks.

I guess I couldn't describe it good in words, that's one of the reasons I create images. I think people have their own answer to this question.

Influences?

I have many influences from friends and artist that I like. I like the way of creating comunity of Cinders Gallery. I really enjoy the work of Taylor Mcimens, works from friends like Sto and Eric Shaw... Also, the works of my hometown buddies Basco, Jose Benmayor, Martín Kaulen, Quillo, Lavina Yelb and Bimer.

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Cheese Burgers!!! When it comes the veggie I prefer something like a real salad.

Literally equal time spent between Fairfield/SF/Oakland every week, 25, Working on a BA in Art History, www.ryandelahoz.com

How would you describe your work to someone?

I would say something like "Mostly it is personal reflection. I used to try to come up with ways to explain it with big words but lately I would rather hear what others think. I think a lot about loss, hope, isolation, freedom from oppression, the destruction of natural resources, myth, magic, the pursuit of happiness. Oh, I don't know" - I'm just testing the water of this crazy world and trying to do what I feel.

Influences?

"Death of an Old Old Man","Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption", the ghosts that live in the upstairs rooms of my Grandmother's house, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, those people that are endlessly hopeful and positive (they usually love cats and or all animals)

My work is a dark, twisted reflection of self, each individual piece mirrors a part of me. My emotions and deep subconscious are cosmically distorted resulting in an inter-dimensional glimpse at who I am through pen and paper. My creations also narrate the words I know not to exist, to describe how I feel, my interactions with other people and often questioning perception, morality, fear and death. Recently I've been exploring themes of emotional connection, isolation and dependence. My past artwork intends to make commentaries on various issues in the world, such as government and religion. I aim to revert to these ideas in the future as right now my work is fueled by the inner-self, rather than my perception of humanity.

I never leave the house without at least one camera at my side. None of my shots are staged so I try to always have a loaded camera and an extra roll of film or two on my hip for when that one scene pops out at me. I develop at whatever chain drug store is in the area, then run home to start scanning. This is the stage when music kicks in.

I like procedures that subtly question the notions of desire, beauty, and sexuality. One constant in my work is to explore female representation, gender archetypes, glamour, artifice and physical transfiguration by using the same printed sources that sell these ideas. In a series of works, titled “Extreme Makeover”, I subvert and vandalize found images of women by means of fragmentation, layering, dissection, exacerbation and obliteration.

Influences?

Mysterious and elusive images. Flickr contacts. Women artists such as Ellen Gallagher, Wangechi Mutu, Josephine Meckseper, Mika Tajima, Marylin Minter, Sylvie Fleury and Meredyth Sparks. They all make sexy, elegant works that present social and political themes in unexpected ways.

Literally just moved up to Portland, OR from SF. I'm 27. Graduated with an MFA from SFAI. And you can see more of my work at www.artbyadamfriedman.com

How would you describe your work to someone?

To keep in simple, I'm fascinated by geology, the natural world, and the relativity of time's duration. I try to show earthly processes that humans would consider "slow," happening really fast or instantly. The images are an optimistic view of the natural world, post human presence.

Influences?

Oh man... so many. I love the Hudson River School painters... Casper David Freidrich, Thomas Cole, Albert Bierstadt, Frederic Church, etc. Contemporary painters like Paul Davies, Ricky Allman, Paul Wackers, James Chronister, and many many more. I have tons of talented friends, like Robert Minervini, Nicholas Bohac, Kevin E Taylor, Ben Venom, and Jon Casey Clary, who are killing it! I read a lot... Edward Abbey is my hero.

I spent a lot of time at the Chicago Art Museum when I was younger. I found the works
of the 17th century Dutch masters particularly interesting; I would try to dissect the
paintings layer by layer in my mind. I figured that magicians must have made them. I
wanted to be a magician too.

I draw people from direct observation. The conversation I have with them during the portrait sitting along with the different expressions and emotions they convey inform how the portraits look. I depict an array of attitudes that will give the viewer insight as to the true nature of the sitter thereby creating an image that holds significance beyond their name and identity alone. They are essentially about how we get to ‘know’ someone, how we connect and what we honestly see when we look at a person. People are fluid creatures that do not sit still and their faces act as a window into a constantly changing stew of thoughts and emotions. What I see in a few hours can say so much about a person’s entire life. They capture so much more than a photograph.

Influences?

Right now I am super interested in the animation work of Chuck Jones and Max Fleisher.

My work is about the influence of western culture on the rest of the world especially the developing world, I look at it as a constant work in progress, I like to look like a possible future or the shape of things to come. I like the idea of using pop icons and objects of consumerism as metaphors and I like to make stories for every image I create. I hate over complicating things when I describe my work, all that art spiel annoys me. Sometimes it's best to just show people and let them make their own mind up.

Influences?

Shit that makes me angry or upset, it's important to know what's going on outside. I get influenced by so much and I change my mind all the time, one minute I'm obsessed with one thing and then 2 days later it's something completely different. But that's a good thing right. I think, because of the nature of my subject matter and the culture I live in, everything around me adds influence. Constant Growth. But I'm into Bill Murray films, Wes Anderson, Jim Jarmusch, Spike Lee, Stanley Kubrick and Coppola. I like films that look at themes of Madness, I've watched Apocalypse Now (Redux) about 20 times now, J.G Ballard, Arturo Herrera, Philip Guston, Claes Oldenburg, Tom Sachs, Sol LeWitt, Jean Michel Basquiat, Istvan Banyai, Rammellzee, hip-hop fucking music. I could go on forever.

I'm just finishing up reading The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick and I'm about to start reading Johnny Mad Dog by Emmanuel Dongala. Good shit.

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Is this how to determine whether someone is a meat eater or vegetarian? (cheese)

Edinburgh, UK, 22, Edinburgh College of Art, BA (Hons) Drawing and Painting, graduated July of this year., www.matthewdanielswan.com

How would you describe your work to someone?

That’s a tough one; I’d say I make images, mainly through painting and drawings. My work is all character driven and I draw inspiration from a massive range of sources. For my Degree Show, I wrote this about my work... Recent works play on the frenetic visuals of heavily costumed live-action Japanese serials, pulp cartoons and the detritus of consumption as a manifestation of database culture and non-narrative. My work exists through an unapologetic embrace of the above and equally through the spontaneity of the mark making process as an embodiment of a fictitious and absurd arena.... I wrote that right after doing my dissertation (on designer toys and consumerism), It does the job but it’s quite heavy on the rhetoric.

Influences?

Trenton Doyle Hancock is a massive influence. He had a show in Edinburgh a few years back (‘The Wayward Thinker’ at the Fruitmarket Gallery) and it was incredible. I’m really into the work of Todd Schorr, and Nigel Cooke too, and I’ve been watching a lot of power rangers recently, the really old stuff from the 70’s. I want to reference that in my work, it’s so good!

Cheese burgers or tofu burgers?

Cheese Burgers all the way, with bacon on top, and chocolate/raspberry milkshake on the side.

Words are tricky, I'm never sure about how to describe my work. I
actually kinda suck at that.. Well, I think there are both psychedelic
and gothic vibes to it. It is colourful and filled up with dark
figures. People often find it mystical, poetic and mysterious. There
is obviously a certain feeling that refers to magic, tales, some kind
of twisted romanticism maybe.. Recently I've been trying to work on
less narrative compositions, focusing a little more on pure shapes and
patterns.

All done with paper cutouts. It's easy to look at and think illustrator or something, but no, these are all hand done and done very well. -Fecal Face.

Tell us a little bit about yourself ( where you live, what you do etc...)

I grew up about an hour south of LA and moved up here in 2004 to go to UCLA. Half way through college I started working for Shepard Fairey and am currently gallery manager at Subliminal Projects and do some t-shirt graphics for OBEY Clothing on the side. I live in a crazy house of five girls, which always makes for a good time.

Can you talk a little bit about your content, you seem drawn toward epic nature, Why do you draw what you do and how do you decide what you want to draw next?

It's exciting to me. In an over-stimulated world this is the stuff the holds my attention and surprises me. I'm not sure if it is because I grew up in Southern California and I'm not used to dramatic weather but there is something very shocking but at the same time very beautiful about events like a thunderstorm. My mom and I where in Santa Fe one time when a huge thunderstorm broke out, we were absolutely captivated and watched it for hours like it was TV. As long as it has that ability, I'll be drawn to it. I am also interested in subject matter that is not tied to a specific time period and that can be relevant outside of the context of my personal experience. These naturally occurring events are much bigger than you and I and are something we have no control over. I think that is a nice reminder of our time and place here and understanding why things happen the way they do in the natural world can answer a lot of life's big questions. When I'm deciding what to draw for the larger pieces it is usually based on a current fascination that I've spent a lot of time researching. I pull a lot of photos and create folders for each subject and then it becomes a matter of piecing different elements together to create the image.

Who/ why all the wrestling in your work? How did you get excited about that?

When I was a kid I was really into wrestling. I would rent all the old pay per view tapes form Blockbuster and keep track of all the matches in a notebook. I so badly wanted to be Jake the Snake or the Million Dollar Man. I guess now I use wrestling imagery to speak about and engage my childhood perceptions of being a man. I also just think wrestling is great subject matter and the kind of stuff that my 8 year old self would really dig.

I don't think at this point it needs to be written since the last update to Fecal Face was a long time ago, but...

I, John Trippe, have put this baby Fecal Face to bed. I'm now focusing my efforts on running ECommerce at DLX which I'm very excited about... I guess you can't take skateboarding out of a skateboarder.

It was a great 15 years, and most of that effort can still be found within the site. Click around. There's a lot of content to explore.

I'm not sure how many people are lucky enough to have The San Francisco Giants 3 World Series trophies put on display at their work for the company's employees to enjoy during their lunch break, but that's what happened the other day at Deluxe. So great.

When works of art become commodities and nothing else, when every endeavor becomes “creative” and everybody “a creative,” then art sinks back to craft and artists back to artisans—a word that, in its adjectival form, at least, is newly popular again. Artisanal pickles, artisanal poems: what’s the difference, after all? So “art” itself may disappear: art as Art, that old high thing. Which—unless, like me, you think we need a vessel for our inner life—is nothing much to mourn.

Hard-working artisan, solitary genius, credentialed professional—the image of the artist has changed radically over the centuries. What if the latest model to emerge means the end of art as we have known it? --continue reading

"[Satire] is important because it brings out the flaws we all have and throws them up on the screen of another person," said Turner. “How they react sort of shows how important that really is.” Later, he added, "Charlie took a hit for everybody." -read on

NYC --- A new graffiti abatement program put forth by the police commissioner has beat cops carrying cans of spray paint to fill in and cover graffiti artists work in an effort to clean up the city --> Many cops are thinking it's a waste of resources, but we're waiting to see someone make a project of it. Maybe instructions for the cops on where to fill-in?

The NYPD is arming its cops with cans of spray paint and giving them art-class-style lessons to tackle the scourge of urban graffiti, The Post has learned.

Shootings are on the rise across the city, but the directive from Police Headquarters is to hunt down street art and cover it with black, red and white spray paint, sources said... READ ON

We haven't been featuring many interviews as of late. Let's change that up as we check in with a few local San Francisco artists like Kevin Earl Taylor here whom we studio visited back in 2009 (PHOTOS & VIDEO). It's been awhile, Kevin...

If you like guns and boobs, head on over to the Shooting Gallery; just don't expect the work to be all cheap ploys and hot chicks. With Make Stuff by Peter Gronquist (Portland) in the main space and Morgan Slade's Snake in the Eagle's Shadow in the project space, there is plenty spectacle to be had, but if you look just beyond it, you might actually get something out of the shows.

Fifty24SF opened Street Anatomy, a new solo show by Austrian artist Nychos a week ago last Friday night. He's been steadily filling our city with murals over the last year, with one downtown on Geary St. last summer, and new ones both in the Haight and in Oakland within the last few weeks, but it was really great to see his work up close and in such detail.

Congrats on our buddies at Needles and Pens on being open and rad for 11 years now. Mission Local did this little short video featuring Breezy giving a little heads up on what Needles and Pens is all about.

Matt Wagner recently emailed over some photos from The Hellion Gallery in Tokyo, who recently put together a show with AJ Fosik (Portland) called Beast From a Foreign Land. The gallery gave twelve of Fosik's sculptures to twelve Japanese artists (including Hiro Kurata who is currently showing in our group show Salt the Skies) to paint, burn, or build upon.

Backwoods Gallery in Melbourne played host to a huge group exhibition a couple of weeks back, with "Gold Blood, Magic Weirdos" Curated by Melbourne artist Sean Morris. Gold Blood brought together 25 talented painters, illustrators and comic artists from Australia, the US, Singapore, England, France and Spain - and marked the end of the Magic Weirdos trilogy, following shows in Perth in 2012 and London in 2013.

San Francisco based Fecal Pal Jeremy Fish opened his latest solo show Hunting Trophies at LA's Mark Moore Gallery last week to massive crowds and cabin walls lined with imagery pertaining to modern conquest and obsession.

Well, John Felix Arnold III is at it again. This time, he and Carolyn LeBourgios packed an entire show into the back of a Prius and drove across the country to install it at Superchief Gallery in NYC. I met with him last week as he told me about the trip over delicious burritos at Taqueria Cancun (which is right across the street from FFDG and serves what I think is the best burrito in the city) as the self proclaimed "Only overweight artist in the game" spilled all the details.

Ever Gold opened a new solo show by NYC based Henry Gunderson a couple Saturday nights ago and it was literally packed. So packed I couldn't actually see most of the art - but a big crowd doesn't seem like a problem. I got a good laugh at what I would call the 'cock climbing wall' as it was one of the few pieces I could see over the crowd. I haven't gotten a chance to go back and check it all out again, but I'm definitely going to as the paintings that I could get a peek at were really high quality and intruiguing. You should do the same.

The paintings in the show are each influenced by a musician, ranging from Freddy Mercury, to Madonna, to A Tribe Called Quest and they are so stylistically consistent with each musician's persona that they read as a cohesive body of work with incredible variation. If you told me they were each painted by a different person, I would not hesitate to believe you and it's really great to see a solo show with so much variety. The show is fun, poppy, very well done, and absolutely worth a look and maybe even a listen.

With rising rent in SF and knowing mostly other young artists without capitol, I desired a way to live rent free, have a space to do my craft, and get to see more of the world. Inspired by the many historical artists who have longed similar longings I discovered the beauty of artist residencies. Lilo runs Adhoc Collective in Vienna which not only has a fully equipped artists creative studio, but an indoor halfpipe, and private artist quarters. It was like a modern day castle or skate cathedral. It exists in almost a utopic state, totally free to those that apply and come with a real passion for both art and skateboarding

I just wanted to share with you a piece I recently finished which took me 4 years to complete. Titled "How To Lose Yourself Completely (The September Issue)", it consists of a copy of the September 2007 issue of Vogue magazine (the issue they made the documentary about) with all faces masked with a sharpie, and everything else entirely whited out. 840 pages of fun. -Bryan Schnelle

Jeremy Fish opens Hunting Trophies tonight, Saturday April 5th, at the Los Angeles based Mark Moore Gallery. The show features new work from Fish inside the "hunting lodge" where viewers climb inside the head of the hunter and explore the history of all the animals he's killed.

Beautiful piece entitled "The Albatross and the Shipping Container", Ink on Paper, Mounted to Panel, 47" Diameter, by San Francisco based Martin Machado now on display at FFDG. Stop in Saturday (1-6pm) to view the group show "Salt the Skies" now running through April 19th. 2277 Mission St. at 19th.

For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to quit my job, move out of my house, leave everything and travel again. So on August 21, 2013 I pushed a canoe packed full of gear into the headwaters of the Mississippi River in Lake Itasca, Minnesota, along with four of my best friends. Exactly 100 days later, I arrived at a marina near the Gulf of Mexico in a sailboat.

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